Workshop shelving

Hi,
I'm setting up my new workshop and looking for some suggestions for shelving. About ten years ago I bought two sets of five shelves about 180cm x 90cm x 45cm from Lidl for my garage. I've been very pleased with them and would get more but they don't seem to stock them now.
Looking around I've seen similar designs in other shops eg. Halfords, but the reviews say they have 3mm thick MDF shelves that go mouldy and sag within months. The Lidl shelves are 1cm thick chipboard and have given me no problems with mould or sagging.
Has anyone any suggestions for decent quality shelves that don't cost the earth? The shed is dry but not heated when not occupied.

I look on places like Freecycle for old wooden furniture and use the wood from that. I find solid wood stronger than MDF and other man made boards (except good quality ply, which can be expensive).

I find that the shelving that uses heavy duty brackets that slot into vertical steel rails with dual rows of slots most useful - you can always easily adjust the heights and gaps between shelves as your requirements and tool inventory changes.

For the shelves themselves, I simply go to B&Q and get them to machine cut strips on their vertical circular saw 'table' from 18mm heavy duty plywood to my specifications, which they do for no charge. (The 8 x 4 sheets are conveniently placed next to the sawing machine).

This system keeps the floor underneath the shelving clear of support legs, so can be used to store ladders and other large items.

I use the same kind of brackets as John, and use wood shelves. This system has served me well for decades.

Thor

+1 for the wall hangers and bracket system so long as the walls are strong enough. London pattern brackets direct to the wall are inexpensive and OK if your loads aren't going to be too great. I use them occasionally but not my favourite as getting the uppermost screw in is always a faff. No clearance for the drill / driver so extensions needed in front of the bit which doesn't help getting the screw straight.

I prefer the good quality green waterproof flooring board for shelves. No splinters like affordable plywood so often has, doesn't warp like solid timber can and the slightly rough surface helps stop things rolling off. The workshop shelves I made from that material are single ones about 6 ft up so I put an aluminium angle finisher across the front with about 1/16" or a bit more upstand. Looks nice and the little ridge means you have to properly lift stuff off.

If you are sure you wont need to adjust the shelf spacing extra supports outboard can be arranged using redundant con-tube or similar.

Given the choice, and funds, I'd use the 1" square tube "speed frame" knock together system. Looks good and really strong., But £££ so it darn well ought to. Couple of nice racks made that way in my loft using "obtained" material.

Clive

Noel,

Not sure where you are in the country, but I have three sets of pressed steel shelving about 1.2m/4' tall, with 4 × 250mm by 1000mm shelves which has been replaced with heavier racking (from a shop fitter who had salvaged them when refitting a McDonald's of all places) and is tucked away under my workbench.

Can find some photos if you might be interested.

Edited By Jelly on 18/05/2023 14:03:57

I also the same as John for simple shelves as well as racking from Machine Mart. Had the racking for a number of years and it is fine. it is one from the cheaper end of the range using thin bent sheet angle for the uprights and I think 10/12mm mdf shelving.

Me too, except as a variant, I've found plastic guttering useful for holding stock rather than only fitting plain wooden shelves. Bit more fuss fixing the guttering in place, but it provides 2 or 3 shelves in one, in which I can separate longish lengths of Aluminium, Brass and Steel.

Dave

Edited By SillyOldDuffer on 18/05/2023 14:26:28

Hi Noel, where abouts in the UK are you I may also be able to help you with shelving. Another Noel.

Make sure that the shelves and brackets are sturdy.

You will find that you put a lot of weight on them without realising just how much.

Mine were the bargeboarding from a neighbour's house. The ordinary shelf brackets are spaced at 12" intervals, and need to be given the piles of stuff placed above them.

Howard

We’ve no idea of your location, so likely unable to help - but I have a surplus of large brackets for those supports that John and Thor use.

I have used this type of shelf system, both in the workshop and indoors.

The version I used originally and that I prefer has the brand name 'Spur'. In early days this was made by an offshoot of Savage & Parsons Ltd.' known initially to me as manufacturers of transformers. The S & P in 'Spur' is easy to link to Savage & Parsons. I believe that, nowadays, the Spur operation is independent.

This shelving system is immensly strong and will support lots of books indoors and quite heavy tooling items in the workshop. Of course, the weight falls first on the shelves so the material used there needs to be chosen with care. The spacing between the uprights also needs to be chosen with care.

I have also encountered a very similar loking system, I think its brand name was/is 'module' or 'locus' or some such name. I have both and, in my opinion, the brackets from one brand do not fit well into the uprights of the other!

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Normal MDF is useless if there's any damp about, unless you like your shelves shaped like sine waves.

The Spur shelving is great, but ensure the uprights are firmly fixed to the wall - I had some detach itself in an unplanned manner once...

Rob

My keyboard is having a bad day!!

For 'loking', please read 'looking'.

Best regards,

Swarf, Mostly!

Another vote for spur shelving, very adaptable with a bit of tweaking you can get the bracket to hold shelves at different angles. Cheap versions available from the big DIY stores.

This lot is all held up by spur shelving and I wouldn't be surprised if the uprights were adding some strength to the somewhat flimsy workshop walls.

This is an example of angling shelves by cutting brackets to hold lathe tooling at a jaunty angle.

Most of the shelving is made from 'Timberboard' from Wickes comes in variety of widths and lengths and being an engineered board (laminated) is fairly stable, takes varnish nicely.

John

Edited By Journeyman on 18/05/2023 17:12:30

Thanks for the replies, there are some good ideas there. The spur shelving looks good as it's easily adjustable. My shed has plasterboarded stud walls so I can fix the uprights to the studs for maximum strength. I don't plan to store any great weight on them, but that could change.

Also you've reminded me that I have some London shelf brackets stored away. I never knew they were called that, every day's a school day!

Jelly, Noel and Not Done It Yet, I'm on the north coast of Northern Ireland, so I doubt I'll be able to take advantage of your kind offers but thanks anyway.

Noel

I do have some shelving but I much prefer the steel cabinets I bought from IKEA. I wish I’d bought some more at the time. Cabinets offer far more protection for expensive tooling. Only very frequently used stuff is kept out in the open for easy access, not that I can’t spare a second or two to open a cabinet door. Mine look similar to these. They came with plenty of shelves which I lined with 3mm MDF to stop the paint getting scratched.

**LINK**

I 'bulk-bought' an apparently identical set of the shelving linked to from Screwfix.

The shelves are thin, but supported across the middle so the MDF actually supports two 450mm squares.

The units are almost purposely designed to induce buyer remorse, thin, 'wangy', and lacking any kind of stiffness until fully assembled and with the shelves in. If you can screw em to a wall so much the better..

They look & feel pretty dreadful, but on the other hand you get a lot of shelving for relatively little money - 175kg per shelf is pretty adequate (even if somewhat hard to believe)..

..not saying it'll last forever, but.. ..the chuck is a 10" P-B on an 'L' fitting, the clamp sets are '14mm slot'-size..

PS this isn't the bottom shelf..

Edited By DiogenesII on 19/05/2023 07:44:28

Diogenes

175 kg per shelf stops being hard to believe the moment you consider the (non) engineering of the common smartly faced chipboard bookshelf sets from Ikea et al. Almost a yard of books supported on 4 wimpy little pins pushed into the uprights. Books by the yard are heavy, really heavy. I'd be scared to try and calculate the loadings involved. Far as I can see the support engagement is about 6 mm long by 4 mm wide per pin, assuming a little bit of load flow from the flat board around the pin. Doing the maths seems to be tempting fate that if I did figure out thing the shelves would realise they actually aren't strong enough and collapse. Something over 9 m length by 2 m high of fully loaded bookshelf its a lot to re-home!

Kit built furniture always seems vastly under-engineered for the job and I hate the way everything flops about until that last part slots in making it a stiff structure. But the Argos bed in teh spare room did get some extra brackets.

I guess the old adage that, for smaller projects up to "needs a few people" size the old adage that if its "stiff enough its strong enough". Peering under a modern car is a (worrying) education into how much load can be passed through how little material if you are clever about it.

Clive